With a launch date on July 29, 2015, there's a lot of buzz around Windows 10. Many early reviews have been positive, with some saying it's the best Microsoft OS ever released. Other more cautious IT pros are approaching adoption with a healthy dose of skepticism. But just how many users and companies will upgrade to Windows 10 is still up in the air.

Sky High Goals for Windows 10

﻿Microsoft has set lofty adoption targets for the OS: They want Windows 10 installed on 1 BILLION machines within a few years of launch. It's theoretically possible, with hundreds of millions of Windows based PCs and tablets sold every year and hundreds of millions more existing devices eligible for a free Win10 upgrade.

With all of that in mind, will OS adoption of Windows 10 take flight, or will the OS have to deal with adoption delays en route to Microsoft's goal? To set the record straight, we turned to the Spiceworks Community and asked more than 500 IT pros how they feel about the OS. Now we're sharing a preview of their insights from the Spiceworks Voice of IT report, Windows 10: Will it Soar?

Stratospheric OS Interest

Across the board, almost every IT pro we talked to is interested in learning more about Windows 10. An overwhelming 94% of survey respondents are at least somewhat interested in adopting the OS, with 49% saying they're very or extremely interested. And the enthusiasm for the OS doesn't stop there... 60% said that they had already evaluated the Windows 10 Technical Preview.

So why the elevated levels of interest? For one, the Windows 10 is no ordinary Microsoft OS. This time around, there's an unprecedented free upgrade offer (for Windows 7 and Windows 8 users not using the Enterprise edition) that will sweeten the deal for many, the promise of a single OS running universal apps across PC and mobile form factors, a visually appealing and highly usable interface, ﻿and Microsoft's intent to make this the last version of Windows you'll ever need... with a host of other new features available at launch and subsequent updates to be delivered on a more frequent basis than with other versions of Windows.

So of these broad changes, what specific launch features are IT pros looking forward to? Unsurprisingly, the news that the start button will return left many IT pros on cloud nine, and features like the free upgrade offer, enhanced security, the ability to upgrade to Windows 10 through Windows Update, and support for multiple desktops factored in too.

What could ground Windows 10 adoption?

Despite lots of early interest, mass adoption of Windows 10 could possibly encounter delays. Preliminary testing of the final Windows 10 code needs to happen and concerns about the OS need to be addressed before IT departments can declare the OS ready for takeoff. For example, IT Pros worry about OS compatibility issues with existing hardware and software, initial bugs that still need to be worked out, user interface changes that will require end user training, and a lack of support from 3rd party vendors. Additionally, unanswered questions around Windows 10 licensing and the free upgrade offer have many IT pros in a holding pattern until they get more information.

Final destination: Windows 10 domination?

That said, Windows 10 could be huge. The benefits of switching to the OS are clear and there's a perception that Microsoft has addressed many of the criticisms that previous versions of Windows have faced for years. Some have even said that the new OS combines the best aspects of Windows 7 and 8 and the limited free upgrade offer could be the extra tailwind that Microsoft needs to give the new OS a head start on it's way to the goal of 1 billion Windows 10 installs.

Perhaps the most interesting fact from our survey is that 73% of businesses plan to run Windows 10 on at least some devices within 2 years of launch on July 29th, 2015. This percentage is huge, and if this level of OS penetration at companies comes to pass, Windows 10 could be bigger than the much beloved Windows 7, which anonymous Spiceworks aggregate data shows was used by 60% of companies 2 years after its launch.

﻿While these predicted numbers are impressive, only time will tell if Windows 10's journey to 1 billion installs will be smooth sailing, or if it will encounter unexpected turbulence along the way.

But wait, there's more!

This post was just a preview of our full Windows 10 survey results! There's more to learn about IT adoption plans of Windows 10 in our full report, Windows 10: Will it Soar?

52 Replies

In other words, 2 months before the free upgrade expires there will be a massive exodus to 10. Or an admin is going to have a good excuse for his boss on why they spent $5000 to update their systems months later.

My IT department will start testing in August. Personally I have been running Windows 10 on my laptop in a domain environment since January so all my home machines will be converted as soon as the ISOs are available for an immediate reinstall after the initial license acceptance by MS.

I plan to begin the process about 1 month after official release. That should be enough time for early adopters to flush out most of the bugs. And I will only do a limited number per day at each location.

I think there are several factors that come into play when trying to answer this question (at least in a corporate environment).

What type of licenses do you have? My understanding is volume licensing is not eligible for this "free" upgrade.

Assuming that licensing isn't an issue, are the apps you run compatible with Windows 10? We've been playing with it and we will really test it once it's released, but if my major software vendors don't support their application on Windows 10 then we are stopping dead in our tracks regardless of any other factor.

What value does it bring? Upgrading just to upgrade is never best practice (IMHO). I upgrade due to life cycles, new features that bring value, bug fixes, etc. Just because a company (not just MS) says "Hey look we have a new product, go buy it!", doesn't mean they get money out of my budget.

Assuming that all three other hurdles are overcome, what's it going to cost me in resources? That includes people, time, and hardware. If you have a Core2Duo running Windows XP and the upgrade is "free" to Windows 10 is that really the hardware you want to run it on? You should have already been sun setting XP due to lack of support, but going to Windows 10 should not be your sunset plan!

In my personal world it's a different ball game. I will update my Surface Pro on the 29th, every report seems to point to these to being made for each other. I will update my other personal hardware based up on that experience. This is not typically my adoption rate for personal use, I like the 1 year or SP1 rule, however I'm willing to make an exception in this case because of what I use this device for on a daily basis (web, email, video streaming) and if I can't do those simple tasks Windows 10 will be dead in the water anyway.

I plan to begin the process about 1 month after official release. That should be enough time for early adopters to flush out most of the bugs. And I will only do a limited number per day at each location.

If Microsoft copied Apple's model of selling nice, expensive hardware instead of the OSaaS, they might find great success. Apple's upgrades are free or cheap, but their hardware pays for it. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

I have tested all our apps here on W10 with no issue - although this was on a VM running on VMWare WS, I still do not envision any problems with the apps at least - the various Hardware has yet to be tested though.

Personally I am going to let my son be the guinea pig at home before I upgrade and at work, we will wait and see.

I have been using Windows 10 at home for over a month as my primary OS and have had very few issues with it.

I also have had a PC setup here at work that I test constantly on, and also have had minimal issues even using older software that we have had issues with in the past. So far the entire process had been pretty smooth as far as testing what we use.

If things continue as smooth as they have been we plan on upgrading almost as soon as possible, most likley a few users at a time so we can 'train' them.

The biggest incompatibility we can think of is our users, they have a hard enough time finding things when a shortcut moves on their desktop....

...Assuming that all three other hurdles are overcome, what's it going to cost me in resources? That includes people, time, and hardware. If you have a Core2Duo running Windows XP and the upgrade is "free" to Windows 10 is that really the hardware you want to run it on? You should have already been sun setting XP due to lack of support, but going to Windows 10 should not be your sunset plan!...

Windows XP isn't available for the "free" Windows 10 upgrade. Systems have to be on Windows 7 or later to upgrade. As such, users of Vista, who won't have fallen out of support yet when Windows 10 releases, are, quite frankly, getting hosed.

I'm very, very interested in upgrading most of our systems to 10. However, they're going to have to clarify the licensing a lot for me. Almost all of our systems have 7 Pro or 8 Pro licenses (the OEM COA), and have been reimaged with volume licensing media and keys per the re-imaging rules. I don't want to in-place upgrade, go through games disjoining and rejoining the domain, or anything like that. They have yet to say what happens in this situation - if I buy a 10 Pro VL when it's available, do the existing COA's count as a valid underlying license, and can I then re-image with the 10 VL?

I'll be upgrading my home machines pretty quickly, and will buy the one VL for my work machine. Everything else is waiting.

...Assuming that all three other hurdles are overcome, what's it going to cost me in resources? That includes people, time, and hardware. If you have a Core2Duo running Windows XP and the upgrade is "free" to Windows 10 is that really the hardware you want to run it on? You should have already been sun setting XP due to lack of support, but going to Windows 10 should not be your sunset plan!...

Windows XP isn't available for the "free" Windows 10 upgrade. Systems have to be on Windows 7 or later to upgrade. As such, users of Vista, who won't have fallen out of support yet when Windows 10 releases, are, quite frankly, getting hosed.

I recently upgraded my laptop to a SSD and imaged my hard drive onto it, but I actually did a fresh 7 install on the hard drive and will be trying 10 out on that. 7, along with all my files and stuff, is staying on the SSD until I determine 10's worth ... and even then, I probably won't jump into 10 right away. I still don't like the whole Metro-App junk, or anything to do with the UI really, so ... we'll see.

I think we will be in W10 in the first 3 months in 90% of the computers. Most computers are already Windows 8, and from those, at least 60% are 8.1.

We have tiers for computers, so our digital signage will go first which will allow me to get better at the upgrade process (and I can do it during the day), then our remote computers, and finally corporate.

New computers will be W10 (at the moment, new PCs have to be 8.1 with all updates before they leave my office)

Why do I push so much? Well, the advantage of being mainly web based tools, and our legacy application hasn't worked well since Windows 7, but instead of staying on XP, I found workarounds to get it running natively in W7 (the application has a lot of 16 bit code, and it is written in COBOL). I already tested in W10 and the app works. Even better, worse case scenario we can use RemoteApp to run the app :)

I worked in a place where we had to test, and double test before new OS. It was a mess. 7 programmers, a ton of in house programs, and only 1 technical person (me). So why we had to use NT in 2003?, or stay in XP because we have a lot of VB6 apps? With that many programmers, they should have been upgrading.

The way I do things now, it forces the vendors to stay on their game. ADP had an app that worked in 7 only, when 8.1 was released I told then that was the deadline, and after that we would go to a new vendor for payroll. 2 weeks later they had the new version. Not everything can be done this way, but I worked hard in the last 7 years to remove dead or slow development components of our business model

I think I will be taking the same approach to this upgrade as my employer does for windows update. Wait for everyone else to be Microsofts quality assurance, then install.

That is my thought exactly.

haha - that's in the survey data too. The majority of IT pros will wait a few months until the initial bugs are worked out or for the first service pack (although there probably won't be service packs as we know them in Win10).